A 'General' Named Bell?

During the presidential campaign.

Jimmy Carter emphasized the need for an Attorney General far removed from politics. Yet the man he is expected to select for the post early this week has close political as well as personal ties to Carter. Griffin B. Bell, 58, who served as a U.S. Court of Appeals judge for 14 years, has been a friend and adviser of Carter's since the President-elect became Georgia's Governor in 1971. Though Bell held no official position in the campaign, he was consulted by both Carter and his aides.

Bell's probable appointment seems to indicate that Carter has reverted to the more traditional practice of choosing as Attorney General a man who may be counted upon not to take policy stands in opposition to his boss. The choice, however, is likely to meet some resistance. Though Carter apparently had Bell in mind from the beginning, he permitted a number of others to think they were in the running, including Congresswoman Barbara Jordan; Burke Marshall, Assistant Attorney General in the Kennedy Administration; John Doar, counsel for the House of Representatives during the impeachment proceedings; U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Shirley Hufstedler; and U.S. District Judges Frank Johnson and A. Leon Higginbotham.

Complains a top Washington lawyer: "The Carter people have played a game from the start. Bell has been the choice all along, yet they have dangled the office in front of a lot of people they were never serious about. More serious and certain to leave a residue of resentment, is the fact that they teased so many capable blacks."

The Carter camp insists that the selection is based on merit. An aide claims that when Carter requested recommendations, people told him, "You've got the best man in the country right down there in Atlanta" -meaning Bell. Outgoing Attorney General Edward Levi praises Bell as a "very distinguished appointment." Another top official in the Justice Department describes Bell as an above-average appeals-court judge. He also thinks that Bell may turn out to be an above-average Attorney General.

In his native parts, Bell is esteemed as a good lawyer and an even better organizer with a quiet, can-do style. Born in Americus, Ga., a mere ten miles from Plains, Bell is a Baptist, like his new boss. Also like Carter, he isa country boy who made good. After attending Georgia Southwestern College and Mercer University Law School, he eventually joined a prestigious Atlanta firm. In 1960, he served as co-chairman of John Kennedy's Georgia campaign. After the election, he was appointed to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.

When the court came to grips with a host of civil rights cases. Bell emerged as a moderate. He wrote the opinion outlawing Georgia's county unit system, which vastly overrepresented rural areas. Last March, he resigned from the court and joined a law firm where Charles Kirbo, Carter's senior adviser, is a partner.

Bell pledges to run an independent Justice Department with appointments based on merit. "I would consider my entire life a failure," he says, if he were to refrain from investigating the Carter Administration should the need arise. But he also indicates that he will approach his job with a certain restraint. "I think we have too many crimes," Bell once said, "and I definitely have the view that we have too many laws."

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